Global Defense Spending hits Cold War levels

[Caelius]

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STOCKHOLM, Sweden - For the first time since the Cold War, global military spending exceeded $1 trillion in 2004, nearly half of it by the United States, a prominent European think tank said Tuesday.

As military operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and the war on terror continue, the world spent $1.035 trillion on defense costs during the year, corresponding to 2.6 percent of the planet's gross domestic product, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute said.

The figure "is only 6 percent lower in real terms than it was in (1987-1988), which was the peak," said SIPRI researcher Elisabeth Skons, who co-authored the organization's annual report.

Worldwide military spending rose by 6 percent, matching the average annual increase since 2002, the institute said.

The United States accounted for 47 percent of all military expenditure, while Britain and France each made up 5 percent of the total.

Besides its regular defense budget, the United States has allocated an extra $238 billion since 2003 to fight terrorism, according to the report. "These appropriations are now assuming extraordinary proportions," Skons said.

While continued military operations in the Middle East are responsible for much of the military spending, the rest of the world is also spending more money on security, the report said.

"It's hard to put the United States in the center, or blame everything on the U.S.," said Alyson J.K. Bailes, the think tank's director.

So much for the relative semblance of peace that followed the Soviet Union's collapse, with the state geo-political and international relations are now I certainly wouldn't doubt seeing those figures rise in the coming years.

[ancient seaman]

Althought it might be true that military spending is going up but there is another parameter that usually nobody pays much attention.Most of the armies are making a change towards proffesional model forces from older conscript based one.This allows them to participate more easily in "freedom" operations with much lower political cost.However this costs more since payment and similar things are taken into consideration.In other words its not that much the cost of purchasing new equipment but the many missions around the world and the proffesional types of armies used.

[Sulla]

Are these number absolute or factored for inflation. If absolute then we are still quite a way from the Cold War peak I would guess.

[DimeBagHo]

It sounds like they adjusted for infaltion ("real terms" usually means infaltion adjusted) but they have not adjusted for economic growth. As a fraction of GDP US military spending is a little less than half of what it was near the end of the cold war, but the US economy has nearly doubled in size since then. So, even adjusting for infaltion, the spending levels must be about the same.

Does it mean anything? Not as far as I can tell - it's just an arbitrary statistic.

I also thought the line about "blame" was just weird.

[Babu]

Are these number absolute or factored for inflation. If absolute then we are still quite a way from the Cold War peak I would guess.

I believe this ought to answer your question.

The figure "is only 6 percent lower in real terms than it was in (1987-1988), which was the peak," said SIPRI researcher Elisabeth Skons, who co-authored the organization's annual report.

By "real terms" I believe they're implying they included inflation and all that other random garbage into the statistics.

Ancient Seaman has a point, however I think its more mainly due to this thing called "Terrorism". Driven almost insane by paranoia Terrorist's are getting governments to spend huge amounts on security over these issues. An unseen enemy is more expensive to stop than a forseen one.

Aside from the war pumping that up, and terrorism, well its just a general theme of the world feeling less secure. Your having HUGE amounts of religious tension with Islam and the rest of the world.....You're having countries like France imposing laws on wearing religious headwear at school, you have bombs going off in Madrid killing hundreds, suicide bombers blowing themselves up in the name of Islam, you have nations fighting over who will give the most AID to the Tsunami relief fund....sometimes you gotta wonder about this world....mostly it's more convienant to forget. I do. There is tension everywhere....I suppose its bound to quieten down sometime...and when it does...something has to be bound to break the silence.....I mean...Can anybody remember September 10th 2001?....I barely can....I just remember talking about Harry Potter with a friend that night. Odd how things change so suddenly....